


A Certain Kind of Stillness

by billiethepoet



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Immortal Husbands Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:53:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25540891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/billiethepoet/pseuds/billiethepoet
Summary: This is how Nicky proves to himself that they’re alive at the end of a day full of death. Joe needs to know in the moment, keeping a tally of life and death as it happens. Nicky needs to know when it’s over. He doesn’t need a tally that ends with one more stroke underaliveinstead ofdead. He needs Joe in his hands, to inspect the damage, and make sure all is well when he’s sure nothing else will harm them that day.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 52
Kudos: 505





	A Certain Kind of Stillness

“The pub across the street. One hour,” Andy calls out as she ducks into the room she’s sharing with Nile. 

An hour is a luxury. More than enough time to get cleaned up. More than enough time for Booker to slip away if he wants to avoid their judgement. Nicky watches as Booker enters the room next to Andy and Nile’s and knows he won’t go even though he has the chance. He’s accepted the punishment of a solitary room when every part of each of them is screaming out for closeness. 

That leaves the third room for him and Joe. 

The hotel is nicer than they would have gotten in the Docklands a hundred years ago but not nice enough for anyone in the lobby to do more than look twice at their battered group skulking past the front desk. It’s clean and it’s quietish and that’s all Nicky wants right now. 

The room is small but with two beds. Joe staggers a few steps before sitting heavily on the foot of the bed closest to the door. They’ll keep the sheets on the one closest to the windows pristine to sleep on later. Something like a reward. 

Nicky stands over Joe as Joe leans forward, elbows on knees and face resting in the palm of one hand. Nicky cups the back of Joe’s head and threads his fingers through Joe’s curls.

“Wait for me?” Nicky asks softly. 

Joe nods without lifting his head. Nicky gives a soft stroke to Joe’s hair as he pulls away. 

The shower is hot, which is also better than they would have gotten in the Docklands a hundred years ago, but Nicky doesn’t want to linger any longer than necessary. He tilts his head back and lets the water run through his bloodsoaked hair until it runs pink instead of red. He uses almost an entire bottle of the cheap hotel shampoo to scrub until the water is finally clear. 

The heat relaxes his shoulders and stings against the sensitive skin of his belly. 

Nicky is quiet in a way that Joe isn’t. There’s a stillness to his body and spirit that has only deepened over the centuries. A soft, unflinchingness to his gaze that he knows can communicate great care or unsettle a person. 

Joe doesn’t keep things in the way Nicky does. On the battlefield, Joe touches and scrambles and reassures himself of Nicky’s safety with his hands. Nicky only looks. Turns that gaze upon Joe and then on to those who have hurt him. 

He scrubs at the blood under his nails until soap suds run down his arms. He could have lost Joe today, just like any other day that leaves their bodies riddled with bullets. 

Joe speaks of their love with strings of poetry and unleashes his passion to strangers and friends alike. It took some getting used to, especially when they could have easily been executed for who they were, but it has always been flattering. 

Nicky holds those feelings in his chest. Not because he’s ashamed or reluctant to share them but because they are part of him the same way the blue of eyes or the calluses on his hands are part of him. Anyone who is paying attention should see it and understand. If they don’t, Nicky isn’t compelled to make them understand. 

He acknowledges his love in quick, matter of fact statements and hard kisses in front of those who would mock them. Not for them but for him and Joe. 

Nicky reacts in sudden bursts of energy and feeling then retreats, while Joe spins out his actions and words more consistently. An explosion versus a bonfire. 

He turns off the water. Ordinarily, Nicky would nudge the temperature up just a bit and leave the water running so it was perfect for Joe but he doesn’t trust the hot water to last that long. He can hear Booker’s shower running and is sure Andy and Nile’s is too. It’s not that nice a hotel after all. 

And he needs some time. Now that he’s grounded and clean, he needs time with Joe before Joe washes away evidence of his wounds and pain. 

Joe reassures himself in the moment but Nicky holds it in and waits until after. 

He leaves the bathroom nude, toweling at his hair. He needs to make sure every last bit of blood is gone before Joe sees him again. Joe has already reassured himself that Nicky’s wounds have healed but seeing Nicky without a trace of death or injury will soothe him. Nicky stops in front of Joe, still sitting on the foot of the bed, and tosses the towel over Joe’s shoulder onto the bed. It’s damp but he still might need it later. 

Nicky flexes his pale toes in the carpet, knowing that Joe is watching them. 

He cups the back of Joe’s head again, the curve of Joe’s skull fitting perfectly, safely in Nicky’s hands. Nicky applies a bit of pressure until Joe looks up with exhausted eyes. 

A little more pressure then and a soft command. “Stand up.” 

Joe rises and Nicky steps back only enough to give him the necessary space. One of Joe’s booted feet rests between Nicky’s bare ones and the light hair on Nicky’s thighs barely brushes against Joe’s pants. 

Nicky takes Joe’s face in his hands. Joe’s jaw against the heel of his palm, thumbs caressing under Joe’s cheekbones. He tilts Joe’s face up and scans across every inch of skin he can see. There are flecks of blood but they likely aren’t Joe’s. There’s a line of blood that cuts diagonally from the hinge of his jaw almost to his Adam’s apple. That could have been a killing wound Nicky didn’t see in the moment. He rubs his thumb across it to make sure the skin beneath is whole. 

This is how Nicky proves to himself that they’re alive at the end of a day full of death. Joe needs to know in the moment, keeping a tally of life and death as it happens. Nicky needs to know when it’s over. He doesn’t need a tally that ends with one more stroke under _alive_ instead of _dead_. He needs Joe in his hands, to inspect the damage, and make sure all is well when he’s sure nothing else will harm them that day. 

Joe stands still and lets Nicky’s inspection continue. Nicky’s hands move across Joe’s back. He fingers at every slash in the fabric of Joe’s shirt, at every stab Merrick inflicted. Nicky memorizes the placement of those wounds with his hands while his eyes lock on every bullet hole and cut along the chest and torso of Joe’s shirt. 

Without warning, without interrupting his stare, Nicky bunches the back of Joe’s shirt in his hands and tugs. Nicky has stripped Joe of nearly every garment popular in the last millenia, stripped him in passion, in exhaustion, and in fear. Joe’s arms rise easily, perfectly in time the pull and tug on his clothing. Nicky tosses the ruined shirt to the floor. 

He starts with the bullet holes in the center of Joe’s chest. The ones that certainly killed him, would certainly have left him dead forever if he was capable of such a thing. Nicky brushes his fingertips across the circles of dried blood, touching each one thoroughly before moving on. He covers every healed wound with his hands as if he were still a priest and had the gift of miraculous healing in his lethal hands. 

It’s not in his hands. It’s in their blood and bones instead.

There’s a long, jagged slash of red that starts at Joe’s navel and continues under the waistband of his pants. Joe opens them, slowly and surely, and pushes them to Joe’s ankles. The stomach wound is wide enough that Joe needs three fingers to cover it fully. It runs more than the length of his hand. 

He looks up at Joe. He has no idea where this came from. 

Joe shrugs, not knowing or not caring to know either. 

Nicky runs his gaze down Joe’s thighs. There’s some blood crusted in the dark hair there but not enough for anything more than a superficial wound. 

“Glass. From going through the window,” Joe murmurs. 

He remembers the same thing from San Paolo in ‘34. 

Nicky settles his hands on Joe’s rib cage. The needle marks and slices Merrick’s scientist took from them are long healed and left no blood as a sign they were ever there. But Nicky knows where they were. He watched every indignity and hurt inflicted on Joe and burned it into his memory. 

He presses his fingertips hard there, willing away any memory or phantom pain Joe may have from the experience. 

It doesn’t work that way. Nicky knows that, but if he could take all the mental anguish and pain and hold it inside for Joe, he would. He would forever. 

“Turn around.” 

Joe obeys without snark or a flirtatious comment. That would worry Nicky if he hadn’t seen it before. Joe’s stillness, in mind and body, comes in weariness. 

He lays a chaste kiss on the curve of Joe’s shoulder. 

Then he turns his attention to the brutal stab wounds in the center of Joe’s back. Being injured or dying in battle is one thing, but being held helpless and hurt over and over again is another. Nicky allows himself a moment to think of Merrick’s crushed body with Andy’s axe’s in his neck. 

He uses his fingernails to scratch away the dried blood against Joe’s spine, flecks falling around them leaving only clean, new skin behind. 

He doesn’t scratch it all away, just enough to reassure that Joe is unharmed underneath. The blood ran in thick streaks down his back that the scientist didn’t bother to clean away before tying them to hospital beds. 

Nicky steps forward, his front flush to Joe’s back, and weaves his arms under Joe’s. His hands rest on Joe’s chest, feeling Joe’s heart beat there as strongly as it has since William the Conqueror ruled the land they stand on. 

It’s almost enough. 

Nicky kisses once, twice, across Joe’s shoulders before wrapping his hands around Joe’s ribs again. He moves Joe slowly, carefully not to trip him in the pants still wrapped around his ankles, turning him and guiding him to sit on the bed. 

Joe watches him, his exhaustion having shifted from bone deep weariness to just needing a nap and a good meal. 

Nicky smiles at him. It’s love and care and forever in one expression. 

He kneels and begins to untie the double knots in Joe’s boot laces. 

Joe runs his fingers through the damp hair on the back of Nicky’s head. It’s the first time Joe has touched him since they walked into the room. Nicky keeps working on Joe’s boots until Joe’s hand stills. He leaves his fingers interwoven with the silky strands of Nicky’s hair but his palm cups the back of Nicky’s head. The tension in Joe’s hand makes the skin on the back of Nicky’s neck prickle. 

“You were scared,” Nicky says without looking up. He slides one boot off. 

“Yes.” 

Joe is always concerned but scared is something new. Andy made it new for them. 

Nicky removes the second boot and strips Joe of his socks and pants before looking up. Joe’s dark eyes are watching him. There’s more love there than Nicky ever thought possible. 

“Don’t be scared, cuore mio.” 

Joe’s hand tightens in Nicky’s hair before he speaks. “We died the first time together. We’ll die the last time together too.” His voice is confident as if bending the universe to his will were easy. The uncertainty lies in Joe’s eyes instead.

Nicky can’t promise that, so he doesn’t. Instead, he surges up and captures Joe’s mouth in a hard kiss. He doesn’t want to stop but Andy put them on a clock and this ritual isn’t finished. Nicky pulls away and Joe doesn’t chase him. 

He pushes himself up, pushing against Joe’s knees for leverage, and steps away. It’s the only way to stop touching him. 

“Go clean up.” 

Joe strips away his underwear while Nicky climbs onto the second bed, laying naked on top of the sheets with enough room for Joe to crawl in behind him. He lets his eyes fall shut. 

“Wait for me?” Joe asks. 

Nicky hums, already falling asleep. “Always.”


End file.
